Day: March 24, 2024

National Security Council Via Teleconference 11:11 A.M. EST MODERATOR:  Good morning, everyone.  Thanks so much for joining today’s call to discuss humanitarian aid for Gaza ahead of the State of the Union.  As a reminder, this call is on background, attributable to senior administration officials, and it is embargoed until noon Eastern today.  For your awareness, not for your reporting, on the call today we have [senior administration official], [senior administration official], and [senior administration official]. With that, I’ll turn it over to our speakers for a few words at the top, and then we’ll go ahead to take your questions. SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL:  Thanks. …

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Well, good morning, everyone.  And it’s a distinct pleasure to have my friend, my colleague, the foreign minister of Peru here today with us at the State Department.  We just had a wonderful moment where it was a great honor for the United States to be able to return to Peru some extraordinary documents dating to the 16th century that document the very first theater troupe in the Americas – quite remarkable.  And thanks to very good work between our governments, we were able to return these documents to make sure that the extraordinary cultural heritage of Peru is…